It’s
not all
that usual, to be honest, to find a country sideman (certainly a
successful
one) who’d claim that XTC were his favourite band. But then
Pat Buchanan is far from your usual country guitar player.

A
tousle-haired,
cheeky rock’n’roller, Pat Buchanan grew up with '70s power pop and only
later drifted into the Nashville world that keeps him so
busy.
Even now, his own band, the Idle Jets, have a distinctly boisterous,
harmony-laden
delight of an album out, Atomic Fireball, even as Buchanan, for the day
job, pops into the studio with Billy Ray Cyrus to bring some
credibility
to his coming album.

But
that’s only
the tip of the iceberg when it comes to people who give him a call to
help
out. ‘It’s like a laundry list’, he says with an
enthusiastic
but modest laugh. There’s so much great music going on in
Nashville,
and I’m happy to make my living playing on country records, but then I
play on Marshall Crenshaw’s new record, and I play with a group called
Swandive, all elegant and posh and Burt Bacharach, and I do all these
different
things. It’s a place you can do everything you’re capable of
doing
and not have the whistle blown on you.

‘I
love being
able to play the guitar for a living, so I’m proud to do sessions’, he
says. ‘But there are two me’s. There’s the Idle Jets
me which represents everything I’ve listened to and absorbed until now,
from the British invasion on through. Then there’s the session
guy
me. I’m really proud how I’ve gotten known in Nashville, it
has a very communal quality, you have a great laugh and yet get a lot
of
work done. I’ll always love going to work.'

Buchanan
grew
up in north Florida, son of a singing mother and jazz bass player
father,
with a drummer for a brother. He joined a band which moved to
Atlanta,
the nearest big lights. Jingle work – and studio experience
– followed to pay the bills. That led to a stint playing
with
disco types Cameo (touring Britain in 1984-85). And that
led
to an album and tour with Hall and Oates, and then Cyndi
Lauper.
‘I went to Japan with Cyndi many, many times’, he says. ‘The
procedure
always was do the album, then tour it. But I had a friend in
Nashville
who kept telling me I ought to get down there. Then one
day,
about 1993, the jingles are drying up and I’m faced with an audition
for
Jellyfish or someone, Michael Bolton probably, you took what you could
get.’

That
was how
he found himself sleeping on a Nashville couch, watching
bouffant-haired
sessioneer John Jorgensen (everyone from the Desert Rose Band to our
own
good queen Elton) recording Pam Tillis’s second album.

‘Everyone
knew
who I was’, he says. ‘They’re all music fans, they pay
attention.
And then I just started climbing the ladder, playing a lot of
demos.
So, fast forward to now… I’ve got the Dixie Chicks under my belt,
they’re
great.’ And seemingly very band minded, so he’s likely to
be
working with them again. Me and John are great friends now,
like two peas in a pod, we’ve both just been singing and playing on a
Gene
Clark tribute album.

‘I
did Kim Richey’s
first album, Rodney Crowell, Tanya Tucker, Travis Tritt, one song with
Mary Chapin Carpenter. Which was fun, we spent the whole time
talking
about XTC, the Pretenders. Nashville has got to the point
where
a lot of the guys have a real rock influence.’

Other
names
crop up. ‘There’s Jim Lauderdale, Cheli Wright, this girl Alison
Page on Capitol who’s only 15 but is set to be the new LeAnne
Rimes.
Only the other day, I played with Earl Scruggs and Billy Bob Thornton,
I think it was an album Billy Bob is doing.’

In
between all
that, Buchanan is a stalwart of the growing live Nashville
scene.
‘I play with the Idle Jets, with a great friend Bill Lloyd, who used to
be in Foster And Lloyd, then Swandive, then a bunch of session guys who
just get together for a laugh, and we play Free, Al Green, J Geils and
just have a blast. I try to diversify, I’m such a chameleon I
need
to do more than one thing.

The
Idle Jets
record is currently bringing him new acclaim among his Music City
peers,
who seem more than content to let him be his own man on their own stuff.

‘When
it comes
to the album, my influences are right on my sleeve… Beatles and Cheap
Trick
and Crowded House and XTC and Squeeze, often in the same song.
I’m
honoured to be a guy who’s trying to breathe some new life into
country,
bring a new slant, get it back to a point where it’s a little bit more
musically valid.'

Not
surprisingly
for someone whose idea of country is a little, how shall we say, left
of
centre, he slips over into the Austin scene too. He’s been
recording
with hip Texan Charlie Robison and plans songwriting with his
equally-hip
brother Bruce.

‘I
also play
in a band called Grooveyard with Reese Wynans, the keyboard player from
Double Trouble – the signer’s John Cowan who used to be in Newgrass
Revival
– and just play covers.’

Just
to avoid
any dull moments, along with working on a new Idle Jets record, he’s
also
recording a solo album. ‘Very orchestral, very Scott
Walker,
XTC, early Rod Stewart. Wild Horses by the Stones meets Pink
Floyd/Beatles.
I steal from the best!’

Buchanan
is
shaping up to be the session guitar overlord of a new generation of
Nashville
recordings, yet he’s not ashamed to still be impressed by the simple
things.

‘You
can just
have Dan Penn turn up at a gig’, he says with a big smile.
‘Or you’re sitting at the lights and John Prine comes pulling up in a
’48
Mercury. And we played Stevie Winwood’s 50th
birthday!’
That’s what music is all about.